


Bloody, But Unbowed

by OldSwinburne



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: BAMF Loki (Marvel), Canon Divergence - Avengers (2012), Crossover, Fix-It, Gen, Good Loki (Marvel), Infinity Gems, Loki (Marvel) Does What He Wants, Loki (Marvel)-centric, Loki Finds the Infinity Stones, Magnificent Bastard Loki, Multiple Crossovers, Trickster Loki (Marvel)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-15
Updated: 2018-07-20
Packaged: 2019-05-23 16:07:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14937530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OldSwinburne/pseuds/OldSwinburne
Summary: In which Loki finds out that Thanos intends to find the Infinity Stones in order to destroy half the universe and thinks, "Well. Better do that first, then."Canon Divergence from The Avengers (2012)





	1. My Head is Bloody, but Unbowed

Loki fell, and fell, and fell.

Twisting and turning through the infinite cosmos, the battered figure of Loki of Asgard, now Loki of No-Fixed-Abode, plummeted down into the darkness. Strange, ineffable constellations and nebulae emerged from the nothingness, blinking past him at speed. Here a purplescent planet, there a gaseous star, another galaxy etc. etc.

Look at his plummeting form, almost winking out of view, and _see._

Loki Laufeyson was currently suffering from something of an identity crisis; for the past few thousand years he had been Loki Odinson, Prince of Asgard, Son of the Allfather. Now, however, he had been relegated to a different origin, that of bastard son of a jotun clasped to the bosom of Odin as some war trophy. A change in backstory of this magnitude, Loki mused, necessitated an alteration in his personal motivation. It was only fitting, therefore, that this emotional and mental turmoil should be matched in its physical state. The bottom had dropped out of his world, it seemed, both physically and literally.

Here is Loki, therefore. Black-and-green leather Asgardian armour protecting battered gangly limbs, horned helm perched on raven locks, ice-cold pale skin only matched by the ice-cold Jotun biology that lay within. He is short by Jotun standards, but tall by anyone else’s. Master of magics and yet shunned by society. Battered, bruised, bloody…. but unbowed.

He falls, and falls, and falls.

And lands.

To any inhabitant of that small outcropping of purplish rock- or perhaps any denizen, as the planet was practically designed to be a holiday home for a third-tier villain- the figure of the erstwhile Prince of Asgard plummeting through the stratosphere would have more closely resembled a meteorite than anything human, surrounded as he was by coruscating flames.

Loki looked up, and squinted through the green haze at a tall, attractive looking woman covered in armour. Loki blinked again and realised that there was actually no green haze, but that the woman herself was green. Oh well then. The viridian woman growled threateningly, and unsheathed a sword, pointing it at Loki’s neck.

“State your name and intentions, trespasser, or I shall run you through where you stand.”

She paused, and looked closer at Loki, seemingly only just realising that he was half-in and half-out of the ground. She tactfully amended “--where you lie” to the end of her previous sentence.

“My name,” said Loki, shifting himself around in the purplescent rock, “is Loki of Asgard, and my current intentions are to lie here a bit more. And lie generally, you see, as it is rather in my job description.”

He laconically spread his arms, as if to show that he was innocent of any wrong-doing, a gesture he had tried in the past but which had seldom ever worked.

The green warrior-woman- possibly one of the Falleen, or a K’aitian, or an A’askvarii without any tentacles- took in this circumspect introduction, and mulled it over for a few minutes. Then, suddenly, she reached forward and grabbed him by one arm, hauling him out of the stone. Loki winced at the sudden rush of pain in his soldier.

“All trespassers are to be taken to Thanos,” said the unusually pigmented lady, with the air of someone reciting by rote. “There, you shall be judged on your worthiness, and your future decided.”

Loki’s recent actions on Asgard- breaking the bifrost, trying to kill his brother, almost wiping out an entire planet- had left him somewhat low on the ‘worthiness’ scale. And why was everyone so obsessed with that particular character trait, as if it was some great arbiter of cosmic power? He got enough of the self-important aggrandisement from Mjolnir, thank you very much.

“By all means, my lady. Although--” and here a touch of anger entered his tone- “I would appreciate it if you could help me up. I’m presently a little _damaged_ from my rapid plummeting through whatever stratosphere this little planetoid has.”

The green-skinned woman accordingly yanked him up painfully- Loki hid a groan behind gritted teeth- and, with one smooth motion, handcuffed both hands behind his back. Loki’s mind went momentarily blank as white hot pain filled his vision. His right arm was currently sickeningly out of its socket, and jostled around agonisingly.

The green-skinned lady was good enough to wait as Loki viciously slammed his loose arm into a nearby outcropping, resetting his arm into the socket with a gruesome _click._ Something a little like pity and a little like anger flickered over her features, and she spoke up.

“You should know with whom you speak, Loki of Asgard. My name is Gamora Zen Whoberi Ben Titan, and I am the daughter of the Great Titan Thanos.”

“I see.” Loki looked Gamora up and down. “And is this Thanos also green?”

Gamora flushed an appealing shade of avocado. “No. I’m adopted.”

“Ah, I’ve danced that dance before, my dear.”

As Gamora and Loki walked through the planet’s cavernous systems, Loki mulled over the events of the previous week. He had been king of Asgard, and then Lord of nothing. He had let go of Gungnir and fallen from the Bifrost with the full expectancy of dying, of taking his own life. And yet here he was, snatched out of the jaws of death by the will of the norns. Loki liked to preserve an outward sign of equanimity in the face of danger, but any apparent calm at this point was the result of an inner numbness. His purpose had already been written out for him for centuries, and that had been taken away from him with the revelation of his birth. Now, he was left with no path to follow, no plan to undertake. He could not remember the last time he had no plan. There was nothing he could do, and so he was merely being buffeted by the winds of fate.

His musings were broken when Loki and his green-skinned captor rounded a particularly large rock to reveal the Master of this particular planet. There, sitting on a floating stone throne with an infuriatingly smug grin on his purple face, was Thanos, the Mad Titan and Destroyer of Worlds. Loki scowled in resentment at the dictator.

“Bow down to me, whelp,” Thanos intoned.

No longer was Loki in a joking, mischievous mood. Gamora he judged as being a possible ally, but Thanos’ malevolence was bone-deep, a powerful, black ague that lurked behind those swollen eyes.

“I do not bow, _sir,”_ said Loki, spitting the words out venomously. “and I am no-one’s whelp. I am Loki Laufeyson, Odinson, and Friggason, Heir to Jotunheim and Prince of Asgard.”

Thanos did nothing but laugh a deep, mocking laugh, sadistic grin curling around his mouth like a scorpion’s tail.

“Asgard, hmmm? That stultifying kingdom of immortals? Oh, how _honoured_ we must be, having a true _God_ in our midst.” The words were said with a deep sarcasm that rankled with Loki. “Shall we set up temple to worship the God of Mischief, or merely recite a poem in his honour? I said _BOW_ , you pathetic creature.”

He clicked his fingers, and Gamora buried a knee into Loki’s back, forcing him painfully onto the floor. Thanos stood from his throne, and leaned closer to the former Odinson.

“Your civilisation, Asgard, is all that I most despise of this agonising universe. You sit there, mired in your gilt castle and your throne of blood, dispensing your own war-hungry judgement on the Realms around you. You hoard those damn golden apples to let your people age into immortality, while those in your colonies starve to death. You live for a thousand years, never dying, while you take, take, take, feeding off the cosmos like a cancer.”

“An undying civilisation sounds like a positive one,” returned Loki. He was rather uneasy, because Thanos made some good points- Asgard was a largely warlike nation, much to Loki’s chagrin. Much of Loki’s role for the past thousand years had been pursuing a diplomatic path, fixing Thor’s mistakes. But Thanos had a fury and rage behind it that spoke of personal experience.

“An undying civilisation is the key to extinction. Nothing moves, nothing advances. Immortality is its own curse. Your people will keep on multiplying until there is no more food or water left, and then they shall die in their golden castles. It will take a truly brave man to do what it takes to stop that decline.”

“And you, I presume, are that man?” said Loki.

“Only I can make the decisions that need to be made.” He returned to his throne, and reclined back into it. “If I am hated for that, than so be it.”

 _Norns, he believes it,_ thought Loki. _He’s seen this theoretical problem and turned it into a life-altering issue, a Malthusian crisis only solvable by mass genocide. He’s cast himself as hero in the drama of murder. The last time I saw someone so absorbed and self-righteous was in a mirror._

“But perhaps you need evidence of my determination? A show of strength seems necessary. Gamora, bring forth the Sceptre.”

The green-skinned Gamora accordingly scuttled off, returning in a few moments with a long, branch-like sceptre with a glowing blue stone at the tip. The stone had a mesmeric quality, and seemed to warp the space around it; it acted like a tennis ball in a sheet of cloth, distorting the fabric of space-time around it.

“The Mind Stone,” whispered Loki in hushed terms. Indeed, there, resting in the sceptre, was an Infinity Stone, an immensely powerful artefact that could alter the very thoughts and minds of those it touched.

“Ah, so you know it? A fascinating artefact. The remains of a singularity from the dawn of the universe, compressed into the shape of a single orb. This one stone allows the user to access the memories, dreams and thoughts of others, resonating at a different frequency. This stone accesses the realm of thought and minds, and can shape them to its will.”

Loki felt something of a migraine coming on; it was unsafe to be around an Infinity Stone  for too long, as they were older then the universe themselves. They were somehow more real, more immediate than everything around it. An experienced sorcerer like Loki could tell where one of the Stones was in the same way that one could tell where the sun is.

“This stone is one of six, as you should know, Jotun conjuror. When these are assembled, as they shall be, I will wipe out half of all life in the universe, and so restore reality to how it should be. No longer will rats fight over old scraps, or people die of famine. No; instead, this new realm I shall usher in will be one where there is an abundance of resources, with no promise of a future apocalyptic death.”

“Because the apocalypse will have failed. Rest assured, Thanos, your plan will fail. And why? Because no man  in the world would take a global sacrifice now to prevent a hypothetical future death. That is not in the nature of any humanoid species. Your plot will sputter out in its infancy.”

Thanos sneered, and snapped his fingers, signalling for Gamora to come and remove Loki. “You speak in vague threats and empty platitudes, Lie-Smith. Let’s see how effective your so-called godlike immortality is. Take him to the dungeons.”

The dungeons themselves- after Gamora kindly dragged Loki there, and had the foresight to hurl him into a cell- were located within the rocky heart of one of the larger asteroids, and clearly demarcated into separate cells. These were  uncomfortably small, four metres by three, and were a dull tarnished grey. The walls were made of some strange alloy of metal and stone, with steel panels half emerging from the rock walls. Loki himself was stapled to the wall, hands near-fused with two iron brackets that were located uncomfortably high up the walls. The brackets were positioned in such a way that Loki had to painfully stretch and stand on tiptoe to reach the floor.

His jailer was a strange, hooded figure whose name came out as a hoarse growl, but whom was generally referred to as ‘the Other’. From what little Loki could see of his face, Loki determined that his skin was a half-melted, pale, deformed flesh-like substance, although this was largely hidden by the gilt cage that curled around his chin. Regardless, the Other was not shy in torturing the former Asgardian prince.

In years to come, when recounting the events of his imprisonment- once, briefly, to Thor, in a muttered exchange with Frigga, and famously dramatised as _The Great Escape of Loki the Magnificent-_ he would gloss over his torture at the hands of Thanos. There were brief memories of the time spent there- stapled to the wall by a firm iron bracket, while the reptilian face of the Other leered down at him. Still more painful to recollect was the times when his captor, realizing his Jotun ancestry, would artificially heat his cell up, causing him to almost collapse with exhaustion. Then the pokers would come, searing the flesh of his bones. His Asgardian durability would allow a certain amount of regeneration, but this only prompted one of the Other’s sadistic games; how much skin could be flayed off Loki’s back before it regrew. All in all, it was not a time Loki recollected with any fondness.

One element that did help alleviate Loki’s pain- and what pain it was, having his lips sewn together and his hands ritually burnt- were the companions he had with him as cellmates. In the cell to his right was a heavily armoured, pug-faced looking alien, dressed in a silvery neck-brace and a sleek black suit, not unlike a Midgardian astronaut uniform. He introduced himself as Styre, and would frequently talk Loki’s ear off.

“The dastardly Thanos shall fall before the might of the Sontaran Empire!” bellowed Styre, uncomfortably reminding Loki of an Asgardian mead-hall. “I shall rend his body in twain with one sweep of my sword!”

On Loki’s left was a familiar face that acted as something of a balm for the considerable torture he had undergone. Indeed, when Loki had first been ushered into the cell, he had scarce believed who was sitting next to him.

“Magnir? Is that you?”

Magnir had been a loyal friend of Loki’s throughout his life as prince. If Thor had Volstagg, Hogun and Fandral to follow him around, then Loki had Forsung, Brona and Magnir, the Enchanters Three. The four of them would spend countless pleasant days debating the different areas of magic, the importance of runic arrays in illusion, and so forth. Forsung was a druidic type, prone to spending long days in the garden of Asgardian, creating flower crowns and communing with nature. He would create healing poultices and potions, and would voyage into the forests of Vanaheim to protect and cure injured animals. Brona came from the grimy streets of Nornheim, straight from a street gang to the personal retinue of a prince of Asgard. His magic was cheap and dirty, mandalas scratched onto his fingernails and runes carved with a pocket knife onto scrap pieces of wood. Magnir, meanwhile, was an intellectual and academic, immaculately dressed in the latest Asgardian finery. He would often be found in his study, comparing different essays on the properties _seidr_ and furiously highlighting relevant passages in quill. He certainly looked very different trapped in a miserable jail cell.

“Your highness?” queried Magnir, a look of benediction on his face. A few weeks prior, Magnir had disappeared, vanished after a visit to the Library of Dream, a vast, Babel-like library that was reputed to have not only every book written, but also every book that had never been written. The ensuing absence of the Asgardian was therefore to be somewhat expected, but Loki had never expected to find him imprisoned.

“I never actually made it to the Library,” explained Magnir, somewhat shame-faced. “My ship stalled suddenly, and I was drifting through space before I was picked up by Thanos.”

“Rest, friend,” responded Loki, smiling warmly. “I am only pleased that you have returned here, now, at my side. Now, please, tell me about our situation.”

Magnir was one of the more intelligent Asgardians, and so had been able to keep his ear to the ground and find out some valuable information. Under careful probing from Loki, Magnir was able to reveal that they were in the asteroid field known as ‘Sanctuary’, a space that orbited the now-destroyed Rustum planet. Thanos’ people had long ago terraformed the structure, and now it sailed through the stars, honeycombed with a thousand jail cells.

“And what of that foul beast, the Other?”

“Ah! Well, as far as I have discovered, the creature’s real name is Kl’rt, a name largely unpronounceable to most races; hence his _nom de plume_ of ‘the Other’. He once belonged to the Skrull race, a shapeshifting species from Tarnax IV, but extensive genetic modification has meant that he has largely lost his transformative powers in favour of physical and mental strength.”

Loki tried ineffectually to wrap his tongue around the harsh syllables. “Klaw-- Klurt-- Kraut--”

“It’s Kl’rt. The pronunciation of the apostrophe is essential in this case. Also, try the back of your throat; it’s a guttural phrasing. Kl’rt. See?”

Loki gave a wry smirk. “Ah, Magnir. I’ll leave that up to you. You were always better at languages than I.”

“Very true, your Highness.” Magnir suddenly remembered Loki’s position as royal, and blushed furiously at his impertinence. Loki made a forgiving gesture, and Magnir continued.

“Kl’rt was once known by the somewhat self-aggrandizing and boastful title of ‘Super-Skrull’, before he became known as the ‘Other’. Apparently, he did not consider himself one of the Skrulls after the experiment.”

“Experiment?”

According to Magnir, a cult of the Skrull race had decided to practice dangerous eugenics on themselves, changing their bodies to become better warriors. These hideous laboratory experiments had taken place on a planet in the Chi Tauri star system, and so these new aliens were given this patronym. That is what the ‘Sanctuary’ was- an factory disguised in an asteroid designed to turn the shapeshifting Skrulls into the ravenous Chitauri.

“And well they might!” exclaimed Styre from the nearby cell. “To transform oneself into a weapon to smite your enemies- why, is there any nobler cause in the universe?”

Loki was somewhat painfully reminded of his past thousand years of Asgard- trying to conduct intellectual discussions while having warmongering incitements screamed in his ear.

Regardless of Styre’s frequent interruptions (“We shall escape from these cells and rend their bones in twain! They shall rue the day they ever sought to imprison Styre the Sontaran!”) Magnir and Loki were able to have a much-needed reunion. Loki was able to learn much of the realities of his apparent new life, while simultaneously informing his friend of the events of the past few weeks. It was gratifying to the former prince that Magnir recognised the stress he was under. Indeed, the revelation of Loki’s ancestry (“A Jotun? You, sir? Well, I clearly must reevaluate my view on the species, having such a sterling example of their valour and courage before me.”) and that of his crimes on Midgard (“I confess I do not see what else you would have done, after the betrayals of Heimdall, Sif and the Warriors Three”) did much to help him mentally heal from the rigours of his past trial. While the conversation was one of reunification and joy, there was one statement Magnir gave towards the end that chilled Loki immeasurably.  

“And before I forget, your highness; Thanos’ plan of culling half of the universe also applies to the prisoners. Every week Thanos’ daughters, Nebula and Gamora, bring the prisoners up and bid them fight in a large tournament. The winner is allowed to survive; those who die are thrown into the vast emptiness of space. Thus, I am afraid, is the will of Thanos.”

Loki stared at Magnir, dread filling his bones; even the rambunctious Styre stilled in shock. Suddenly, the walls seemed to be much closer and more constraining, and the darkness seemed to grow and grow.  


* * *

 

Time, in the cells of the ill-named ‘Sanctuary’, passed strangely; or rather, as there was nothing besides the four walls, the periodic attentions of the deformed Other, and the occasional conversation of Magnir and Styre, it was impossible for Loki to keep track of any self-imposed calendar. It was only an estimated period of several months (weeks? years?) that this dire routine was momentarily lifted, and the green-skinned Gamora and a blue-tinted companion came to visit Loki. The second figure was a stranger to Loki, but was just as striking as Gamora; this figure seemed curiously artificial and inhuman, with different stripes of blue demarcating her face. The entire left side of her body was reinforced with metallic additions, primarily in a smooth curve around her eye and in her arm, which was completely artificial. Apparently, half her body had been effectively removed- presumably in conflict- and replaced with an ill-fitting temporary replacement. The cyborg fixed her furious eyes on the prisoner, and Loki had the strange urge to revert to his blue Jotun form to see her reaction.

“Prisoner Code 3746-Alpha and Prisoner Code 8937-Gamma, be silent. Prisoner Code 9159-Epsilon, this message is addressed at you,” said the cyborg, to which Gamora barely resisted rolling her eyes.

“Protocol is not always necessary, Nebula. Styre and Magnir, your interference is unnecessary. We are here to talk to Loki Laufeyson only,” she paraphrased. Styre made to say something before a signal from the newly-named Nebula sent a bolt of electricity through his cell. Magnir wisely decided that discretion was the better half of valour.

“It is by decree of the Great Titan Thanos, Saviour of the Universe and Hero of the Downtrodden, that the Jotun Loki will face the Asgardian Magnir and the Sontaran Styre in glorious combat to determine who will survive and continue in his grand utopia, and who will be cast out into the depths of space.”

Magnir and Styre, although unable to speak, looked shaken at this news. They had known that they were to be forced into the ring of combat, but they were not aware that Loki would be joining them. Loki himself managed to contain his reaction, but he was incredibly tense internally.

“Having slain the others in armed combat, the victor will then face me on the battlefield, and so ascend to the ranks of heroism, albeit in the posthumous sense.”

Nebula sent a smug smirk at the three assembled prisoners, who were stewing in a heady mix of fear and rage.

“This is all in the service of the Great Thanos, hero of the--”

“You use that word incorrectly, madam,” snarled Loki, interrupting with a savage politeness. “Hero. It peppers your lips like flies over carrion, but methinks you have not the slightest notion of what a true hero is.”

This time it was Gamora’s turn to speak, and she let out a cynical laugh, while Nebula continued to spark angrily at the frost giant. “And I suppose you would take that honour for yourself? You of a thousand titles, but master of none? Are you a hero?”

“Yes. And no.” said Loki, looking intently into Gamora’s widened eyes. “We are all heroes in our own way, but that is in no way a good thing. We are all motivated by doing what is right, but there is no such thing as the right thing. Some hunt down criminals and eradicate evil-doers, while some fight the corrupt system ‘for the people’. Some people work to kill the evil monster lurking under the bed, while others valiantly save the misunderstood creatures of this world. All of us are motivated by doing what is right, but none of us know what that is.”

“So- you’re saying that nobody knows what they should do to become a hero?” asked Gamora, confused and shaken out of her harsh enforcer persona.

“Not quite. Let me tell you a story. My not-brother, Thor Odinson, God of Thunder and Prince of Asgard- regarded as a hero by many. One day, the jotnar Hrungnir was accused of disturbing the Asgardian peace, sewing dissension and dismay wherever he went. The Mighty Thor was tasked with defeating this interloper, and smote him with his hammer Mjolnir. The whetstone he was using shattered and fell to Midgard, and one piece of it stuck in Thor’s forehead, and is still there to this day. Hrungnir’s body trapped Thor for quite a time before he was released by a nearby guard. But, despite the hardship he faced, Hrungnir was vanquished. What say you of that, Gamora of the Zen Whoberi?”

“Thor is the hero, then? He killed the Jotun, and you told me that they were evil creatures, right?”  
“I’m afraid that my views of Jotun have changed significantly over the past few days. Let me tell you another story. Hrungnir was in Asgard to oversee the Jotunheim-Asgard treaty, a development that aimed to create peace throughout the Realms. The talks were going well, until, one day, Hrungnir, flushed with triumph, went to one of the local alehouses and began drinking. Odin took his momentary drunken stupor as an excuse to send Thor Odinson, his own personal hammer, to assassinate him and destroy the treaty, shattering into into a million pieces. Hrungnir, himself a peaceful man, wanted to gain some measure of reparation for his planet, but was murdered. Who is the hero there?”

“I don’t know. It’s all so complicated.”

“Life often is. Remember, what appears to be one thing is often another. And there are two sides to every story.”

Nebula, hitherto silent, spoke up. “You babble, prisoner, but I do not see your argument.”

“I am saying, O Gamora of the Green and Nebula of the Blue, that those who call themselves heroes are often the worst kinds of villains- although I acknowledge that, yes, those who call themselves villains are often the worst kinds of heroes. I am saying that your father, Thanos, for all of his claims of the greater good, will see the universe turn to dust with merely a snap of his fingers. I am saying- nay, begging- that if either of you happened to stumble across one of the Infinity Stones, those that Thanos quests for so much, that you take it and run as far away from the Titan as possible. Change from the hero who labours under another’s yoke to the hero who will fight the corrupt system. That is what I am saying.”

There was silence. Loki could not determine the reaction his speech had had; both the failing light and the naturally stoicism of the two aliens prevented that. It was ultimately Nebula who broke the silence.

“I don’t profess to know what you intend with those words, Loki Lie-Smith, but our intentions coming here were not to bandy words of philosophy with a prisoner. They were to tell you that you have been chosen to fight in the arena, to see if you deserve to live or die.”

Gamora then took up Nebula’s speech. “This competition will be to the death. I do not know if you will survive; I fancy not. But, regardless, your place in Thanos’ pantheon will be determined. My only advice is ‘do not lose’. Farewell.”

With this, Gamora turned dramatically, and left the cells. Nebula had flinched at the mention of losing, but had Loki been less eagle-eyed he would not have noticed it. She followed her adopted sister, lost in her own thought, and for a moment Loki felt a powerful kinship with the blue skinned woman, before it disappeared with her around the corner.

Loki sat in silence, contemplating what he had learned. Magnir spoke up, having been silently watching the whole exchange.

“What are you going to do, Loki?” he said, for once foregoing political niceties in the heat of the situation. “How are we going to survive?”

His not-mother, Frigga, had frequently preached the importance of parsing out his personal situation before determining his course of action. “If you do not know where you are,” she would say, eyeing the young Loki through her mirror while she combed and braided her hair, “you will not know what to do, and if you do not know what to do, you will not know where to go. A moment of introspection is often needed in a dangerous situation.” Loki had taken these words to heart, combining frequent bursts of the aforementioned introspection with measures of brooding and portions of plotting, all of which were useful in his current situation.

To summarise, therefore, Loki was trapped in a prison cell deep in the centre of some asteroid-like planet just off the Nine Realms, with several light-years and bad decisions separating him from anyone who could help him. He was presumed dead, had been tortured both physically and psychologically, and was currently manacled to the wall in a way that did not fully suit his body image. He was only a day away before he was forced to fight in an arena to the death, and, when the options left were death or servitude to Thanos, neither exactly suited his purposes. He was in the grip of a mass-murdering psychopath, who possessed one of the most powerful magical artefacts in the universe, and intended to use it to wreak destruction on everything he had ever known.

Not a great position to start from.

What were his goals? Well, escape would be a good start, although he would gladly accept an end to this agonising torment. The destruction of the Nine Realms was also something he did not want, or at least, not unless it was on his own terms. So when escaping- which he still had no idea how to do, as he was currently stapled into the wall sixty feet from the floor- if he could grab the heavily-guarded infinity gem on the way, somehow evading further capture while carrying the galactic equivalent of a nuclear bomb, that would be grand.

Assets. Nothing. He literally had been stripped of everything apart from his name. Any clothes, items, or inlaid runes had been ruthlessly removed by the Other. His position was hopeless. There was no way he could effect his escape, ensure the freedom of two other prisoners, and simultaneously commit the heist of a century---

His _name_.

In the darkness of Loki’s cell, his smile turned as sharp as a knife.

“Styre, Magnir,” said Loki, mind whirring like a saw, “I have a plan. And you must both do exactly what I say.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is partially canon compliant- it's imagining what happened behind the scenes, in an attempt to explain some inconsistencies. However, it will diverge from canon later on.
> 
> Magnir and the Enchanters Three are actually Marvel characters. I thought that Loki needed someone at this back in Asgard. Chi Tauri is actually a real-life star system, so how about that. Styre the Sontaran is from an old Tom Baker 'Doctor Who' serial. The Chitauri are the Ultimate Comics version of the Skrulls, hence their backstory here.


	2. Black as the Pit

The Zen Whoberi were now extinct, wiped out by the hand of a mad titan, but two things remained from that once-great civilisation. One was Gamora, the green-skinned daughter of Thanos and recognised as the Most Dangerous Woman in the Universe. The other was a story.

A story about a thief.

Once (goes the story) there was a man named Prefect. He was tall and blue eyed, and always carried a satchel with which he kept his belongings. He would hitchhike around the universe, visiting new places and taking things for his own. One day, he came across the Universal Church of Truth, a galaxy-wide religious cult that saw the decimation of dozens of planets through control of two powerful artefacts: the Little Doctor, a weapon that was able to rend planets open at the molecular level, and the Nova Bomb, a device which could undo the gravitational bonds of the sun itself. 

“I’ve got to stop this,” said Prefect, looking at the destruction of the two bombs. “I’ve got to steal the Nova Bomb.”

The news of Prefect’s threat shocked the upper echelons of the Church. Guards were increased, borders tightened, suspicious figures interrogated. The Nova Bomb, an unwieldy device at the best of times, was relocated to the distant planet of Thaf Beta VI for safekeeping. Several attempts by ranging marauders were made on the device, and hysteria grew and grew. There was panic among the High Priests of the Church. It was ultimately decided that an expert policeman, Sergeant Ford of the Galactic Patrol, would be invited in to deal with the danger.

“Oh dear me,” said Sergeant Ford, looking around at the preparations the Universal Church of Truth had made. “This won’t do, this won’t do at all.”

“What won’t do?” demanded the High Lord Papal, leader of the Church. “We have done the best that we can to stop that rascal Prefect from stealing the Nova Bomb.”

“You’ve gone about this the wrong way,” said Ford. “You’ve been trying to hide  the bomb away, but we really need to set a trap. I shall take the Little Doctor, and lie in wait by the Nova Bomb for Prefect’s ship. And when he arrives-- zap! Nothing but component molecules.”

The Church hemmed and hawed about this, of course, but the decision was ultimately reached. Ford waited by the Nova Bomb, the Little Doctor in his hands, for the arrival of the dreaded criminal. And this is where the tale of that scoundrel Prefect and the good man Ford takes an interesting turn, because, after a few weeks guarding the doomsday device, Sergeant Ford left, taking both the Little Doctor and the Nova Bomb away with him. In its place was a note: “ _ You were wrong to think that I wanted only one bomb away from your hands. You were also wrong not to invest in Terran automobiles. Yours, Ford Prefect.” _

Ford Prefect was given one weapon to guard the other, and so walked off with both. There was no need for uncomfortable theatrics or carefully-planned heists, when lies and trickery are on the table. And there was something about Loki Lie-Smith that reminded Gamora, the last of the Zen-Whoberi, of the thief Prefect. And this filled her heart with hope.

The truth was, that for a long time Gamora had been internally hostile towards Thanos. The memory of Thanos’ destruction of her home planet rankled, a kernel of hatred that remained throughout any of her faux father-daughter discussions. And so to see Loki, who seemed collected and calm despite his conditions, was a balm to her bruised soul. Perhaps he had a plan. Regardless, Loki was quickly gaining the title of ‘Prefect’ in her mind. 

It was towards Loki- and his cellmates, Magnir and Styre- that Gamora was headed now. She had been tasked to deliver all three to the arena, where they would be forced to fight and kill each other, with only the victor being allowed to survive. It suited Thanos’ beliefs best that way. To him, there was nothing more just than the most able, intelligent and fearsome prisoners continuing on; it was survival of the fittest, with blades and blood substituting for nature’s more gradual threats. Proxima Midnight, one of the Children of Thanos, had been selected for the ‘honour’ from a similar system; she had been tasked to kill both of her cellmates, and now those sorry souls- a Karazian Light Monk named Graf Toren and a Thermian called Quellek- were lost in the vast reaches of space. Proxima, meanwhile, had become one of Thanos’ main enforcers. Winning the tournament and capturing Thanos’ interest was a double-edged sword. Gamora herself often wondered whether she would not have been better off dying with her parents back on Zen-Whoberi. 

All three of the prisoners came from warrior cultures, which would make their inevitable conflict in the arena even more interesting. Field Major Styre was a Sontaran, one of the most dangerous species in the galaxy. Armoured to the hilt, and with a strong desire for war and a stronger one for bloodshed, their race had waged a fifteen-thousand year war with the Rutans, spilling throughout the universe with the howling echo of guns and explosions. Legend had it that a Sontaran would never run from danger, and would always faith death with a rebellious smile; it was considered anathema for them to even turn their back on a foe. It was therefore even more unusual that one was denigrated to a prison on some backwater asteroid belt. Sontarans were not  _ imprisoned;  _ they were reserved for glorious death in battle. There was Thanos’ twisted mercy, granting unwanted clemency to a warrior race, barring them from a glorious finish.

Magnir, as an Asgardian, was also from a warrior race, and was also barred from Valhalla due to his dishonest capture. Unlike most individuals from a warrior race, however, Magnir was much slighter than most of his kin; rather than heavy muscles and square jaws, the Enchanter was slim and weedy, with russet-brown hair and no chin to speak of. For his current position, he was severely overdressed in Asgardian formalwear. A light blue cloth tunic was overlaid with the highest quality Aesir chainmail, with heavily inlaid Vanaheim braces crisscrossing around his arms and legs. He took the position of ‘dandy’ to an almost preposterous extreme; hardly the same figure of unrestrained violence and bloodshed as his cellmate. Instead, any violence would come from his poetry; Gamora would often pass by the cells to see him and Loki exchanging ritualised competitive verse in an activity they called ‘flyting’. 

When Gamora arrived at the cell, however, Magnir was not his normal foppish self. Instead, he was huddled in a ball, tear tracks lining down his face, whimpering fearfully. His hollow eyes were fixed on Loki, who sat smiling shark-like in his cell. The terrified Asgardian turned at Gamora’s entrance, and scrambled to the bars of his prison.

“Please!” he gibbered. “Please! You’ve got to get me away from him- he’s insane!”

Gamora stepped back slightly at this unexpected display. From what she had seen, Magnir and Loki had been fast friends. What had happened to have turned them so suddenly and violently against each other?

“He’s changed,” Magnir spluttered. “He’s gazed into the abyss and it’s consumed him, made him a shadow of his former self. I have no idea what atrocities he’s capable of now.”

He leaned in close, fixing Gamora with wild, unseeing eyes.

“He directed the full weight of the Bifrost to the planet Jotunheim, just to achieve his own political machinations. He destroyed half of a whole planet, just because he wanted leadership of a seperate realm. Who knows what he could achieve with more resources! He’s a maniac!”

“Oh, a maniac, am I?” sneered Loki, lit with inner derision. “Please, Magnir, illuminate me on how that is the case. As you can see-” and here he lifted a manacled hand- “-I am quite the  _ captive  _ audience.”

Magnir took a deep, grief-filled breath. “You aren’t the friend I knew, Loki. I don’t know what happened in the time we spend apart, but your heart has turned as black as ice. Half a planet, you fiend! I can’t even imagine the worldview and skill-set that would be needed to commit genocide on such a scale. Why, you  _ monster,  _ if there were any other tyrants bent on widespread destruction, I sure you would have a lot to offer--”

Loki hit one balled-up fist savagely on the cell doors, rattling them and shutting him up. “I see you still have much to learn, Magnir, in relation to the ways of the world, not to mention a little thing that I call  _ subtlety.  _ What one person calls bad, I call good. What one person calls a catastrophe, I call an opportunity. And what one person calls genocide, I call a necessity.”

Styre took this opportunity to speak up. “There is no honour in what you do, Lie-Smith,” he said, the deep rumble of his voice reverberating his battle-armour. “I would turn my back on you, but that is forbidden under Sontaran lore. Instead, I shall merely say this: you are capable only of evil deeds and death.”

A bitter laugh came from Loki. “Fools. Imbeciles. You know nothing of the higher purposes that I serve. You see the world in black and white, not in the arching wheels of colour that I perceive. There is more here than what meets the eyes. Magnir, your mind is constrained by dusty books, and you do not know the myriad of options and realities in the wide world. When the future life is on the line, you must see that conventional morality must be dismissed as the friendly lie that it is. Yes, Magnir, a lie- trust me, as I know what I speak of. I am, after all, the God of Lies.”

Magnir attempted to make some small conversational riposte, but was interrupted when Loki turned his attention to his war-like companion.

“And as for you, Styre, your obsession with honour does you no credit. I would rather be an alive traitor than a dead hero. But I believe that our green-skinned jailor wishes to have some words with us?”

Gamora suddenly felt very, very weary and very, very old. She raised her hand and signalled for the guards to take the prisoners to the arena. 

“Silence,” she said, trying to not react to the beginnings of a migraine. “I care not what quarrel you three have with each other, nor what your views on comparative morality are. Any quibbles you have may be dealt with in the arena, in bloodshed and violence. I’m sure the victory will come easier in battling enemies, and not friends.”

These words came no easier to her in that moment then they ever had. It tore at her that she was forced to practically execute another group of people, but thus was Thanos’ will. She had almost hoped-- but never mind. 

Magnir seemed frightened enough that he had to be dragged, while Styre shrugged off the guards who attempted to manhandle him. Loki smiled, and mockingly presented his hands to be handcuffed, giving an unnecessary flourish. 

As Gamora went to join Thanos in the observation room overlooking the arena, she mulled over what she had seen in the cells. There was something else going on here that she wasn’t seeing, some hidden subtext that left her feeling uneasy. The three prisoners had been fast friends, and it seemed unnatural for them to turn on each other in such a manner. If allegiances like that could change in an instant, what was to stop her position on Sanctuary being damaged? And if she ever, God willing, moved on to form stable friendships with Nebula or some other third party, what was to stop those bonds from vanishing like dust in the wind?

The observation room was built in such a manner that it jutted out over the arena, windows enfolded around a sphere to give a full view of the space below. The end result looked rather like a large fishbowl. The arena itself was less impressive, looking more like the black pit of Hel than a reasonable location for fighting. When Gamora arrived, she was not alone; Thanos sat in pride of place on his customary floating throne, but he was joined by two others. Corvus Glaive sat at the Titan’s right hand, his hooded face pale and orc-like, while Ebony Maw sat at his left. The eyes of Glaive were cold, glittering with an inner maliciousness, while Maw appeared more regal, pupils reduced to squinting orbs covered by wrinkled skin. His nose was non-existent, smoothed over by years of interfering surgery. Their names were well-chosen, for when Thanos faced an enemy, he had his glaive to strike them down and his gaping maw to swallow him whole. 

Gamora walked in mid-conversation; Maw was debating heavily with Glaive on the merits of forming an army. The warlike Glaive wanted to send the Chi Tauri army like a plague into any world that opposed them; Maw advocated a more gradual scheme. They quietened when Gamora appeared.

“I see my daughter has arrived,” rumbled Thanos. “Have the prisoners been delivered to the armoury?”

Gamora nodded. “Abrella has them now. He’ll prepare them for the tournament.” Agent Abrella was the Sanctuary weaponsmith, principally reduced to giving the damaged and discarded prisoners damaged and discarded weapons. The better guns and swords were given to Thanos’ main army. Abrella had been resistant to this when he first arrived, buffeted by the flows of the solar winds, but a few sessions with the Other had changed that view. Now, he stalked around the corridors of Sanctuary with his absurd cylindrical helmet, the melodramatic cape flapping behind him.

“What is it this time? A Sontaran and two Asgardians?” snarled Glaive.

“One of the Asgardians turned out to be a Jotun, I am told,” said Maw. “Kl’rt relished burning the poor soul. You should hear him talk.”

“I hope the Sontaran wins. No- I hope that they all lose. I hope they all die and are flushed into space to pop like a balloon. Death is the only answer,” Glaive returned, glorying over each murderous syllable.

“Oh, go strangle a Lazoon, won’t you?” sighed the long-suffering Ebony Maw. “That should ease some of the tension you’re apparently feeling. You have to work through these excess emotions.”

They were interrupted by a roar from the crowd, baying at the arrival of the three prisoners. One in particular stood forward, assuming the showman position as he proceeded to showboat with the best of them.

“Is that--?” began Glaive.

“Yes. It is,” sighed Gamora.

Loki stood in the middle of the arena, arms outspread, and gave a delighted grin. “Citizens of Sanctuary!” he exclaimed, “You have come for a display of might and wits above all else, and my word, you shall be repaid in full. Behold, my companions- Magnir the Mighty, age-old sorcerer from the realm of Asgard, expert in necromancy and dark magic! Legend has it that he defeated Fingon the Elf in the Battle of Unnumbered Tears! Gasp in awe as he weaves magic beyond your wildest imagination!”

Magnir, still looking sulkily at Loki, muttered “Never liked necromancy, anyway.”

“And here is Field Major Styre of the Greater Sontaran Army, Head Advisor of the G3 Military Assessment Survey, Vanquisher of the Void of Kobol, and Scourge of the Cetaganda Empire. A hand, gentlemen, for you will not see his like again.”

“This Styre fellow,” murmured Maw to his companions. “Does he remind anyone else of a potato, or is it just me?”

Loki resumed his speech. “And I am Loki Laufeyson, Fallen Prince of Asgard, God of Mischief, Chaos and Terror, Liar and Deceiver, Destroyer of Jotunheim and Killer of Gods. You came here for murder and mayhem, my dear friends, and I am more than happy to oblige.”

Gamora raised her eyebrows at this. He wore the title of Fallen Prince like a proud badge, daring anyone to oppose his claim.  _ I am a villain,  _ he seemed to shout,  _ I am hear to destroy and corrupt, so what are you going to do about it?  _ He was aware of the negative public opinion around him- the story of his destruction of Jotunheim, thanks to Magnir’s loose lips, and spread like wildfire- and instead of attempting a cover-up, he make the looks of hate a rallying cry.

And yet… there was something  _ off  _ here. His cellmates had turned on him almost overnight, buying in to this theatrical version of villainy. The Loki in the arena, arms outspread and daring the audience to turn on him, was not the Loki who had plummeted from the sky, heart hollow and worn from his experiences. Something was going on behind the scenes, and Gamora did not know what it was. 

Loki was a strange character. What did it say about him that, in the middle of an arena, he adopted a ringmaster position and turned the whole procedure into a theatrical event?

Thanos stirred slightly in his throne, interested at the words of the God. He leaned over to murmer to Gamora, “Destroyer of Jotunheim?”

“That was what his cellmates were calling him. Apparently, he wanted to be ruler of Asgard, so he destroyed half of Jotunheim to get it,” Gamora dutifully relayed, to Thanos’ growing interest.

There was a hush in the air, the heavy electrical charge that comes before the storm. Magnir’s eyes flickered nervously between Styre and Loki, while Stye remained beadily fixed on the God of Mischief. Loki was nonchalantly leaning against the wall of the arena. It felt like a bad joke; a Sontaran, an Asgardian and a Jotun walked into a bar, although the added promise of bloodshed meant that no-one was laughing. Instead, there was an anticipatory bloodlust among the audience.

Styre, growing tired of parlour tricks, made the first move. He unhooked his firearm from its position on his back, charged it up with a steady pulsing  _ whum whum whum,  _ and sent a plasmoid bolt surging towards Loki. There was a fiery explosion; but when the smoke cleared, there was only a heavily scorched wall.

“Miss me?” quipped Loki, who shimmered into existence at the other side of the arena. The audience  _ oohed  _ appreciatively at the feat.

Styre’s own gun- a standard issue Sontaran Cobalt Blue laser rifle- had been confiscated by the Other, and so the Field Major had been granted access to one of the many weapons from Abrella’s Sanctuary armoury. These all came from previous prisoners, and so were all ramshackle and falling apart in some respects. Styre’s weapon was replaced with a derelict Slammers Powergun, the former possession of a mercenary who had met his demise in the ill-named Sanctuary. It ejected a copper plasmoid that exploded upon impact; had Loki not teleported out of the way, his green armour would have made an effective new wallpaper for the arena walls. 

The gunfire had, to Gamora’s eyes, jolted Magnir into action, and he leapt at Styre, conjuring a staff out of thin air. Five inches of suddenly-fabricated rosewood connected with the potato-headed Sontaran skull with a sickening crack, and the armoured warrior skittered back into the dusty ground. 

“A worthy hit!” exclaimed Styre. “But one which did not shatter my carapace; a Sontaran can withstand even the heaviest of blows.”

Magnir rolled his eyes, moving his staff into a defensive position. “Oh, give it a rest, will you? You don’t even have a carapace. It’s  _ armour,  _ which you would know if--  _ aargh!” _

The Asgardian wizard jumped to the side as two knives whistled through the air, slicing vicious holes through his cape. Magnir gave a terrified glance at Loki, who already had two knives in his hands, to replace the ones he had thrown. 

“Less talking, more fighting, Magnir. We have a show to put on.”

To anyone with military experience- and there were precious few people at the arena that day who did not have military experience- the range of different combat styles shown by the three contestants would have been surprising. Styre was a heavy-built, slow moving fellow, toting his gun around laboriously and dispensing plasmoid justice wherever he went. Magnir had spent several years of his youth exploring the combat of Vanaheim, and it definitely showed; he was able to pull off highly impressive acrobatic stunts, whirling around his quarterstaff like a pinwheel of death. Loki, meanwhile, was tricky, teleporting from place to place like a shadow, throwing his knives and both of the other parties. 

_ Vhooom!  _ Another shot from the Power-Gun barrelled towards Magnir, and he somersaulted over it, as nimble as an Asgardian deer. The three figures were soon engaged in a flurry of fists and blows, making it difficult for the viewing crowds to understand what was happening. Of those in the observation box, Corvus Glaive seemed excited with all the bloodlust; Ebony Maw was viewing the events with an ill-concealed interest. The Power-Gun let out another volley, its golden metallic surface hissing and snapping with the heat emerging from it. 

Gamora squinted her eyes at the actions of those in the arena. There was something else going on here, behind Loki’s rapid-fire quips, behind Styre’s jingoistic bellows, behind Magnir’s startled imprecations. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but it reminded her, somehow, of the theatre. Regardless, the violence was typically brutal; Gamora winced as a blast from the Sontaran’s gun grazed Magnir’s arm, causing a wisp of smoke to emerge from his silken Asgardian armour.

Styre let loose another round of ammunition from his Power-Gun, but this time he let out a gurgling groan and dropped his weapon. His gun, a somewhat cobbled-together affair at the best of times, had overheated, causing a red-hot charge to run through it and scald the fingers that were on the trigger. This weapon, making metallic noises as it began to cool, was furiously thrown aside by the rampaging alien.

“A true warrior does not need a weapon,” sneered Styre, “for the greatest weapon is the body!”

Styre resumed attacking with a vengeance, this time without his gun; instead, he used his significant musculature to slam into the two Asgardians, moving like a wrestler to take out his opponent. As Magnir swung his staff, it was grabbed by two potato-like hands and sharply pulled, sending Magnir stumbling off his rhythm. It seemed that the lack of the Power-Gun was not too detrimental for the Sontaran; still, several members of the audience seemed disappointed.

“Bloody Abrella,” spat Corvus Glaive. “I was hoping for something interesting coming out of this fight, not three idiots swinging their fists at each other.”

“I hardly think it’s his fault, Glaive,” responded Gamora, with a certain amount of derision. She did not like the arrogant alien. “Were we to provide him with good weapons, this sort of thing would not happen.”

Styre lunged at Magnir, sending the slender Asgardian flying. A sickening crack signalled that a bone had broken; his left arm seemed to be jutting out at an odd angle. The sorcerer gave a muffled scream, and harsh invectives floated up to the observation room. The Sontaran boomed a hearty laugh, and began to crow about his victory to those around him.

Ebony Maw spoke up. “I rather think that things are becoming interesting, Corvus. Look.” He pointed at a figure materialising at the other end of the arena. It was Loki, and he had the Power-Gun.

“They say a bad workman blames his tools, but I must admit that most of the blame for your failure here can be attributed to this overheating weapon of yours.”

He began walking towards the Sontaran, a cocky smile on his lips. For his part, Styre was frozen in utter shock. He began to mutter something, but no-one present that day could here it. 

“Do you honestly believe that I would allow you to continue firing that weapon if that was not  _ exactly  _ what I already desired? Do you have the temerity to suggest that your actions were not precisely what I intended them to be, that you are merely acting out the play-script I have long since devised? Oh no, my dear Styre, that is not the case at all.”

He rubbed a gloved hand gently over the the barrel of the Gun, aiming it at Styre’s head.

“I wanted the gun to fire. I wanted the mechanism to fail. I wanted the gun to overheat. That way, we are in this enviable situation in which I have a gun and you do not. So, what does a member of a warrior civilisation have to say?”

“Only this,” snarled Styre. “Die, foul trickster!” With this statement, Styre ran toward the laughing God of Mischief, altering his body like a bullet to piece Loki’s armour. Styre barrelled forwards like an unstoppable juggernaut, while the Asgardian merely laughed wickedly. Styre charged closer, close enough to touch, and then…

...passed right through.

The Loki that had been holding the Power-Gun flickered into non-existence, only for the actual Loki to emerge from thin air at the other end of the arena like an angel of vengeance. He stepped over the prone figure of Magnir, who was still moaning from his broken arm, and levelled the Power-Gun at the back of the Sontaran.

If there was one thing Loki knew, it was that most traditions had their origin in necessity. It was tradition for Asgardians to bury their dead by means of a burning boat, as it would allow their souls to ascend to Valhalla, the heat of the flames roughly equating to the clash of battle. It was tradition for the amorphous Shoggoths to intone ‘Tekeli-Li’, as a means of remembrance for the horrors that came with their former cruel masters. And it was tradition for the Sontaran race to never turn their back on a battle, as they had a small probic vent in the back of the neck. This proved the only weak-spot of their armour, to the extent that, when Loki fired a charge at Styre’s back, the plasmoid blast sent a powerful shock running through the Sontaran, and he dropped down dead. 

There was a moment of shock among the crowd, as they became accustomed to the fact that one of the contestants was dead. Corvus Glaive gave an admiring murmur, but Gamora only felt sick to the stomach.

“I suppose someone more reasonable would follow that up with a duel with the remaining party,” added Loki, his tone artificially light. He laid a mock-parental hand onto Magnir’s head, his brow still specked with sweat. “We would have a magnificent back-and-forth; I would transform into a Cobra, biting and hissing with venomous intent, and he would metamorphose into a mongoose, their natural enemy. A bat to an owl, a tiger to a stag, a crocodile to a gorilla. I’m sure that would be an entertaining sight to see, but I prefer to cut to the chase, as it were.  _ Dentes Albentes!” _

A sickly green glow emerged from Loki’s outstretched hand, surrounding Magnir with a coruscating, almost electrical light. Magnir  _ screamed,  _ beating the floor in utter agony. His head snapped back, bones showing against his skin, his unbroken arm trying to quench his groans by covering his mouth. The onlooking audience grew yet more uneasy; even Glaive was momentarily silent, while Ebony Maw, himself something of a magician, muttered the name of the spell to himself, not identifying it.

“ _ Please no,”  _ thought Gamora to herself.  _ “Not this. Not him. This is a slippery slope, and torture is something I cannot tolerate.” _

After what seemed an agonisingly long time, Magnir’s screams grew less and less, until finally he quietened and collapsed. The body- and it was a body now, the spirit had long since left it- shrank down and fell, a broken doll fallen from a dressing table. 

Before the crowd could evaluate what had happened, Thanos stood up from his throne, and cleared his throat. Any murmurings of the audience instantly stilled. This was Thanos the Titan, whose mad conquest had sparked the death-knell of a thousand worlds. When he spoke, people automatically listened. 

“We have all observed your performance, Loki of Jotunheim, and you have secured your position for your future life. That is to say-” and here he gave a wide, malicious grin, “-you will not be cast out into the empty cosmos. To determine whether you are allowed a place into my personal inner circle, however, there is one more test you must undergo.”

One of the doorways to the arena began to slowly open, discharging dust and soot as it did so. 

“I dislike making an easy challenge for my future Children of Thanos, so I shall explain further. If you lose, you shall be die, but not in the cosmos of space; no, you shall of the honour of a special immolation, courtesy of Corvus Glaive here. If you win, then your opponent will be put to death in a similar manner. The balance of the world must be preserved; the coin toss is equal and random, with only the strongest surviving.”

He reached up one large purplescent hand to wipe a crocodile tear theatrically from his eye. “Of course, as this is one of my own children’s life on the line, this fills me with grief; however, life can be cruel and harmful, and so we must do all we can to replicate those positions. Nebula!”

The blue-skinned cyborg entered the arena, to the general adulation of the audience, and Gamora’s heart clenched in her chest. Loki or Nebula. Fifty Fifty. Heads or Tails. One dies, one lives. Exactly half of the universe.  _ Oh God. Oh God, why? _

In many ways, Nebula and Loki were very similar. Both adopted by kingly warlords; both struggling with their elder sibling; both wobbling on the edge of a moral dilemma. Both, for fear of being trite, blue. Looking at them standing there, facing each other, in the arena; they looked like two identical reflections, two halves making a whole.

Two sides of the same coin.

The combat, when they did begin, was fast and brutal. Each blow was neatly parried, arm meeting arm and fist meeting fist. They were both too skilled in unarmed combat to fall to the other; instead, the music of perfectly choreographed attacks and feints filled the arena. This was until Loki decided to add a discordant note and remove a knife from a side-holster. This was used to slice thin strips into Nebula’s partially robotic arm, prompting the alien cyborg to snarl viciously, and input a few codes into the buttons on her shoulder.

Suddenly, the fighting stepped up a notch; Loki was moving backwards, knives glinting in the sun, as Nebula’s arm became a mass of whirling daggers and blades. Clearly, several mechanical alterations had been made, increasing her chances of winning the battle. The metal smoothly flowed into a sword, then a shield, then a scalpel, then a scimitar. The arm would separate into different octopus-like tentacles, wrapping around Loki’s hand, crushing it; Loki gave an angered growl and teleported away. Any trace of levity had vanished from his face, dropped as one drops a mask that is no longer useful.

The fighting resumed, but this time it had a slower, more careful feel. Loki was probing Nebula’s defence, using sallies and feints to determine if there were any openings in her form. He soon discovered that her arm had some sort of self-awareness. When he rolled around the back of her and attacked, aiming to create a vicious slice across her shoulders, the arm twisted around and blocked the dagger. This was without her looking, rendering the matter miraculous had it not been explained by her metal defender.

Loki was frozen momentarily by this realisation, leading for the deceptively fast android limb to lash out and rain a painful blow onto his solar plexus, expelling the air from his lungs with a soft  _ whumpph.  _ He staggered backwards, but Nebula had already done her damage; his ribs felt cracked, and he struggled to breathe.

Loki would have made a quip here- insulting one’s opponent, or ‘flyting’, was a respected Asgardian art that the God of Mischief had wholeheartedly embraced- but his throat had a throbbing soreness to it that rendered such a decision unwise. Instead, Loki scythed his arm around-- a quick flash of silver and steel-- Nebula’s hand raised in defence--

The manoeuvre ended with Loki’s dagger embedded in Nebula’s palm, her face flushed with pain and anger. Her fingers twitched ineffectively next to the handle. 

And then, in a visually horrifying tableau, her fingers arched backwards like spider-legs, grabbing the handle of the knife in an anatomically impossible fashion. Her hand split apart around the knife and rotated, causing a whirr of cogs and gears until she was holding the knife, with only a ragged scar as any indicator that she had been stabbed. 

“Do you think I am out of the game already, Prisoner? You have no idea of my power,” Nebula boasted, and proceeded to input a code into her shoulder. Her face cleared, lines and wrinkles that emerged during her pained rictus disappearing. “This mode prevents me from picking up any pain from that arm. You’ll find, Lie-Smith, that I am far from vulnerable.”

Indeed she was not; this latest upgrade rendered her even more lethal on the battlefield. Although she wanted no death in this match, part of Gamora’s heart burst with pride at Nebula’s abilities. Loki was forced onto the back foot, barely dodging each swipe from the blue cyborg’s bladed arm. The clash of metal filled the air, polished steel crashing against medieval leather vambraces. 

The lack of pain in Nebula’s limb allowed her to move with extra speed, and she was able to palm the knife that Loki had stabbed her with to attempt several vicious stabs. In the furor of combat, however, she did not notice what several other members of the observation box noticed; that Loki’s skin was slowly becoming an icy blue. 

Gamora realised, with a gasp, that whenever the two combatants clashed, the chill of the innate Jotun biology would send tendrils of ice across Nebula’s forearm. Nebula did not notice, the normal warning that the pain would bring not occuring. The thin, creeping carpet of frost eased around the elbow, causing the metal to crinkle in the bitter cold. 

This virus, this parasitic chill, took several moments to have an effect, but eventually the invading frost made its way through the mechanisms of the arm, sending it juddering into an agonising collapse. The screech of metal against metal could be heard, until her arm froze up, unable to move due to the twisted nature of the internal machinery. With a sharp slice, Loki severed the iced appendage at the shoulder, and it landed in pieces on the dusty floor.

“So,” came the sibilant tones of Nebula. “That’s your strategy, is it? Get rid of your opponent’s weapon, and use that time to strike?”

Loki gave an electrifying smirk. “Well, it’s true that I like to  _ disarm  _ my enemies, my dear.”

“Did he just---?” muttered Ebony Maw, under his breath.

“I think he did,” confirmed Gamora, rolling her eyes. “Nebula will be fine, anyway. We can fit her with another limb after this.”

Both Nebula and Loki were considerably fatigued by the conflict at this point; one was missing an arm, and the other was nursing a broken rib and was having trouble breathing. It was to no-one’s great surprise that soon, both bloody and bruised (but unbowed) they collapsed, splayed backwards into the dusty floor of the arena.

Thanos seemed about to speak, but Gamora, sensing an opportunity, spoke up first. “It seems that the contest is a draw; the two have both drawn blood, but neither have succeeded in killing the other. While there is traditionally two outcomes of a match like this one, it seems a third path has been selected, with both participants entering into the Black Order.”

Inwardly, she prayed for this result; a movement away from Thanos’ binary live/die mentality, to a wide field of alternatives. Loki was truly one to not fit into a normal black/white morality system.

“Let the bodies of the vanquished prisoners be cast into space, and let Nebula and Loki- once they have awakened from this slumber- join us in our council rooms. The Will of Thanos Be Done.”

“The Will of Thanos Be Done”, echoed the crowd, and if said Thanos was displeased by Gamora’s declaration, he seemed pacified by this approbation. Loki remained, dead to the world, on the floor of the arena. Two brutish-looking reptilian aliens- a Hork-Bajir and a Drakh, respectively- emerged from an alcove and began to drag the corpses of Magnir and Styre out, in preparation of being thrown out of an airlock.

 

* * *

 

Styre and Magnir drifted, swallowed up by the dark infinity of space, the cold reaches of the cosmos sending icy tendrils to blacken and bruise their icy skin. Magnir’s cloak billowed out in the nonexistent breeze, while the blue metallic armour of the Sontaran began to crack and distort with the gravitational pressures bearing down on it. The skin greyed, the cheeks hollowing as the oxygen began to slowly leave their lungs. It was a pitiful epitaph to two intergalactic warriors who had been voyaging for years.

“Really Magnir?” came a voice. “ ‘He’s gazed into the abyss and it’s consumed him’? Where did you find that pithy line? The first draft of a Vanaheim opera?”

The voice had come from Loki, but a distilled version of the same; a phantom version of the God of Mischief had appeared, but one worn thin on the tapestry of life. He was vaguely translucent, and the winking stars of the Pleiades could be seen through his silvery form. It was important not to forget that a sorcerer of Loki’s repute was capable of Astral Projection.

There was a shimmer in the air as a band of green coruscated across the two corpses, removing any traces of the icy coldness and restoring the healthy flush to their bodies. With a sudden gasp, Magnir and Styre inhaled life-giving breath, and jerked back to existence. The wounds they had gained in the arena- a broken arm for Magnir, and a bruised neck for Styre- shimmered and vanished. The Asgardian gave a grateful smile to his prince. 

“I’m sorry, your Majesty,” said Magnir the Magnificent. “I’m afraid stressful situations like that trigger my fight or flyte reflex.”

“Frankly, I’m surprised we got away with it. What was that you said? ‘If there were any other tyrants bent on widespread destruction, I sure you would have a lot to offer’? I felt like I was at a job interview. I’m surprised she bought it; but then, sometimes subtlety has to be dispensed with,” responded Loki. “It was necessary, however. I had introduced myself as Loki, the God of Mischief, a proud prince of Asgard; I needed to be known as Loki, the God of Evil, and the destroyer of Jotunheim. In order to get into Thanos’ good graces, I needed to change my name.”

“Well, not literally, your Majesty.”

“No; but the power of a name and reputation has a magic greater than any sorcery I can conjure. In the days to come, I will need to don many masks and play many roles- I can only hope that I do not forget which one is mine.”

Styre, never the fastest star in the solar system, spoke up, confusion clouding his voice. “Friend Loki of Asgard! I confess I am somewhat unsure of what has been happening- why are we floating in space? Where are we going, precisely?”

The ghost of Loki gave a wry smirk. “We have already discussed this, Styre, as you well know, but I can recognise an invitation to brag as well as anyone. In short, we are here because it is the only way of escaping this Norns-damned Sanctuary intact; by already being dead. Your ‘corpses’ were discarded out of the airlock and into the depths of space, allowing me access to this particular patch of the cosmos here.”

He waved an illuminating hand at his surroundings, taking in the distant blue swirls of the Smith’s Burst nebula, the twin suns of the legendary Magrathea, and the pearlescent Ormazd planet. There, in the centre of the inky blackness, was a area of space that somehow seemed  _ deeper,  _ more intangibly  _ present  _ than anywhere else.

“Here, in the space behind Rustum, is a passageway, a portal, a knot in the wood of the Yggdrasil tree, a wormhole, an Einstein-Rosen bridge, call it what you like, that will take you from this place to another place. From there, you can return to Asgard- or Sontar, in your case, Styre- under your own energy. Charter a ship, hitch-hike around a bit, I don’t know. This should lead you to Barsoom, if I am correct, although it has been a while since I’ve walked this merry road.

“As for the battle, I thank you for your cooperation there, as well as the staged ‘argument’ in the cells earlier. That, of course, had a definite purpose. A perceived falling out meant that any conflict between us would look more realistic, and your mention of my destruction of Jotunheim, Magnir, should mean that Thanos thinks me a kindred spirit. Hardly a position I enjoy being in, but needs must when the devil drives. Hopefully, my display would mean that I am promoted to his ‘Inner Circle’, allowing me to take the Mind Stone when I leave, on some pretense I shall create at a later date.

Styre’s potato brow wrinkled in further confusion. “But what of the spell you cast on Magnir? He was in agony! I hardly think that befitting of a warrior.”

Magnir chimed in with the solution. “I can explain this, your Majesty. With sorcerers, much of our magic is a mystery to the general public. To the uneducated, one spell looks very much like another. What appeared to be a variant of the pain-causing  _ Cruciatus  _ curse, was, in actuality-” -and here he gave a pearly grin- “-a teeth-whitening charm.”

There was a moment of sheer camaraderie, a feeling of communal relief that they were  _ here,  _ together, having made it out of Thanos’ torture chamber, having escaped the clutches of the vile other. There was a feeling of jubilation, of heady laughter and enjoyment, that touched the hearts of all three unlikely space adventurers. They embraced each other with the pleasure of a difficult battle won, although as Loki was currently nothing more than a wandering spirit that was made somewhat difficult. And then--

“I’m afraid I must leave you now. My body is currently unconscious in the arena back at Sanctuary, and I expect I will be called to Thanos’ council soon. We may not meet each other again, but if, Norns willing, we do, know that I have a bigger challenge for you two.”

There was a significant pause, as the bodies of Styre and Magnir drifted closer to the gap in space, and the coruscating lights that signalled a jump into interdimensional began to corrupt and distort the edges of their vision. The red plains of Barsoom began to ease into the monochrome blackness of space, like two levels of writing overlaid onto each other, a palimpsest of galactic proportions.

“We must find the Infinity Stones, my friends, and we must strike Thanos down for good.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which I realise I am much more comfortable with exposition than I am with fight scenes.
> 
> My thanks to 'BleedingMagpie', who pointed out that vermilion was red, not green; I've gone back and corrected this to 'viridian'. 
> 
> Prefect is Ford Prefect from Douglas Adams' "The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" (1978).


End file.
